Title: Drop a Heart, Break a Name

Drop a heart, break a name. It was no longer cruel cliché, but a way of life. She lived by it, survived by it. People were pawns, and she preferred controlling them. Why else would she being doing what she did? She dressed carefully, watching herself in the floor-length mirror.

The dress was knee length and clung lovingly to her every curve, sparkles shimmering on the pale gray satin. Lace edged the low-cut bodice, drawing the eye to her ample chest. She slicked her lips a crimson color and fiddled with make-up the way women do, using an expert hand to apply lotions, powders, and creams, and then wiping them off to begin again.

The light in the room was soft and came from a single lamp in the far corner. The room itself was decorated boldly and with exceptional taste; the siren red of the walls went well with the furniture in the room. She, too, fit with the room. She was bold and stunning, if not quite beautiful, and many men could attest to her being exceptionally tasty.

Tonight’s affair was the Winter Ball, held annually by one of the well-to-do families in town. They were bastards, all of them. The wives spent their days gossiping at luncheons and chairing committees, and their nights making very appropriate attempts to create an heir with the door locked in case a servant should happen to be walking down the hallway. Their husbands, on the other hand, spent the daylight pushing papers or using old money to make new money, the moonlight hours with the wife who made a delightful arm adornment, perhaps working towards a an heir. The time in between, they spent with her.

The man who would be at her house in a matter of minutes had neither wife nor children. He though, was merely tonight’s escort, the of-course-I’m-not-boffing-your-husband-look-whose-arm-I’m-on cop out. On the flip side, the one paying for her house, who also happened to be giving her some cash to take an escort to the evening’s gala, had a wife and three children. He despised the first and gave not one damn about the later. She gave her hair a fluff, moved a few wispy, curling tendrils to frame her face. When her date arrived, she would float down the steps nearly as soon as he rang the doorbell. Unlike a wife, she would never keep a man waiting.

Aveline Ashby was a mistress, and proud of it.

When a man decided to end his affair for one reason or another, be it divorce, scandals, or the like, she took it philosophically. And since she was no longer spending her nights with him, she could easily drop his name in casual conversation for a social boost with no broken hearts and no hard feelings. To her mind, there was no such thing as a broken heart, for love did not exist between man and woman. That was lust. She could love her job, and her life as a ladder climbing socialite. But there was no connection of that sort between two people.

When the doorbell chimed, Aveline strolled smoothly down the steps in glittery, four-inch heels. She could see by the look in the eyes of the man behind her front entrance that he’d be coming home with her after the ball. That was fine. Some women scrubbed floors and spent their lives serving on their knees. Aveline preferred serving on her back.

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